3 ms·

This looks like a nice service, but I don't get this idea of programmers suggesting the salary. Companies should make an offer based on their business needs and

by revorad 14y ago

This looks like a nice service, but I don't get this idea of programmers suggesting the salary. Companies should make an offer based on their business needs and the profile of the prospect. Then, it's up to the prospect to accept or reject the offer. The power balance is already pretty heavily in the favour of employers. This just perpetuates the status quo of treating programmers as interchangeable commodities which come with fixed price labels.

bitsweet 14y ago
Pitchbox is not just about optimising on salary only, which is important, but also on the developers' interests and career goals. The developer retains all the control...for example the salary is only used by Pitchbox, not the employer, as one of our filters in the matching process. We ask companies for their compensation ceiling and developers for their compensation floor to make sure engineers aren't matched with companies that are not within the same range. Every pitch a developer receives includes compensation information among other things.
- revorad 14y ago
  Matthew, thanks for the clarification. I'm sorry, my original comment was a bit too harsh. I've been speaking to a few companies recently, and apart from tactics like trying to fish out a salary number, I've also been surprised by their unresponsiveness to emails, strong dislike for employee side projects, and unrealistic expectations. Everyone's crying about how hard hiring is, but if this is how they treat employees, it's not surprising really. I wish you luck with Pitchbox and hope you can help improve the situation.
vonmoltke 14y ago
To supplement your point, having the programmer suggest the salary also creates problems in that Pitchbox is separated from specific geographic regions. The salary I want for the exact same job varies greatly depending on where it is. My number for San Francisco would price me right out of Austin, for example.
- peterjmag 14y ago
  Exactly. A while back, I was considering jobs in both Colorado and the Bay Area. A $100K position in the Bay Area might only be worth half that in my home town of Fort Collins (and perhaps $70-80K in Denver). I wouldn't want to undersell myself by selecting $60K during the signup process if I thought that I could make more than that in the Bay Area. When I first checked out Pitchbox earlier this year[1], that uncertainty was enough for me to skip signing up entirely. bitsweet mentioned below[2] that my selection is used only as a filter and not shown to employers, but I think that could stand to be made more clear either during the signup process or somewhere on the landing page. EDIT for another slightly related point: I take it this is for US-based employers at the moment. Are there any plans to expand to other markets? Now that I'm moving to Berlin, I'd love to use something like Pitchbox in my job search (though incidentally, salaries are a completely different story over there). [1]https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5022472 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5022472 [2]https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5521244 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5521244
  - bitsweet 14y ago
    It's not clear, which is our fault, but we do take this into consideration when looking at other geographies for relocation. We also always share compensation in a pitch, so you know early on if the adjusted comp is reasonable for you. Thanks for the feedback though, we'll certainly be exploring a different sign up ux.
danielpal 14y ago
Looks like the salary is only to filter possible employees and only internally used by pitchbox employees. They want to make sure if you talk to a possible employeer they can match your salary expectation.

by revorad 14y ago

bitsweet 14y ago

Pitchbox is not just about optimising on salary only, which is important, but also on the developers' interests and career goals. The developer retains all the control...for example the salary is only used by Pitchbox, not the employer, as one of our filters in the matching process. We ask companies for their compensation ceiling and developers for their compensation floor to make sure engineers aren't matched with companies that are not within the same range. Every pitch a developer receives includes compensation information among other things.

revorad 14y ago
Matthew, thanks for the clarification. I'm sorry, my original comment was a bit too harsh. I've been speaking to a few companies recently, and apart from tactics like trying to fish out a salary number, I've also been surprised by their unresponsiveness to emails, strong dislike for employee side projects, and unrealistic expectations. Everyone's crying about how hard hiring is, but if this is how they treat employees, it's not surprising really. I wish you luck with Pitchbox and hope you can help improve the situation.

vonmoltke 14y ago

To supplement your point, having the programmer suggest the salary also creates problems in that Pitchbox is separated from specific geographic regions. The salary I want for the exact same job varies greatly depending on where it is. My number for San Francisco would price me right out of Austin, for example.

peterjmag 14y ago
Exactly. A while back, I was considering jobs in both Colorado and the Bay Area. A $100K position in the Bay Area might only be worth half that in my home town of Fort Collins (and perhaps $70-80K in Denver). I wouldn't want to undersell myself by selecting $60K during the signup process if I thought that I could make more than that in the Bay Area. When I first checked out Pitchbox earlier this year[1], that uncertainty was enough for me to skip signing up entirely. bitsweet mentioned below[2] that my selection is used only as a filter and not shown to employers, but I think that could stand to be made more clear either during the signup process or somewhere on the landing page. EDIT for another slightly related point: I take it this is for US-based employers at the moment. Are there any plans to expand to other markets? Now that I'm moving to Berlin, I'd love to use something like Pitchbox in my job search (though incidentally, salaries are a completely different story over there). [1]https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5022472 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5022472 [2]https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5521244 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5521244
- bitsweet 14y ago
  It's not clear, which is our fault, but we do take this into consideration when looking at other geographies for relocation. We also always share compensation in a pitch, so you know early on if the adjusted comp is reasonable for you. Thanks for the feedback though, we'll certainly be exploring a different sign up ux.

danielpal 14y ago

Looks like the salary is only to filter possible employees and only internally used by pitchbox employees. They want to make sure if you talk to a possible employeer they can match your salary expectation.